It’s true that this is decorticate, but Cladina also never has squamules (note, squamules have an upper cortex). Look at photos of C. scabriuscula on google — this looks very typical for that species. In general, there are several branched species of Cladonia, some even more branched than this. See, for example, C. furcata and C. uncialis.

[It’s also worth noting that Cladina has turned out to be just a small part of Cladonia (is it even monophyletic?) and is officially no longer recognized!]